Sunday, February 16, 2014

Good Morning Justin...

Letter to my Son

Sunday, 16 February

A warm welcome and the strongest coffee

Good Morning Justin…

A flurry of goose-down swirls about the full moon before
settling amid the grizzled stubble of harvested fields. Trees are drowsy shadows having no care. Rooftops slumber. A small face from around a drawn curtain peers
into another winter night. The old dog sleeps,
his back to the draft within his tiny home.
Nearby a truck groans through its gears as it slows to cross the old
iron bridge whose dank lattice-work joints are briefly swept by the light from
the truck’s yellowed lamps. Within the
cab its driver gulps a last swallow of cold coffee, fighting off the teasing thoughts
of warm blankets and a cool, fluffed up pillow for his sleep starved head. He cranks down the window and revives momentarily
with the rush of frost-bit air. These
backcountry farm roads hold no pity for the weary traveler. Soon the pavement ahead will be lost in a
blanket of white. The truck slows. This is country for negligent deer abruptly stepping
into one’s only available path. The cab’s
window is now tightly sealed. The driver’s
neck and upper back begin to ache as muscles grow ever more taught from
strain. There’s no chance for sleep
now. The mind no longer drifts and has
embraced the status of full alert.

Let there be light.
Let there be a shining sign with the promise of fuel, caffeine and a
paved area in which to park and catch a few winks. Let there be a welcoming stranger behind a
counter just ahead happy to share a word or two of comfort and humor and revive
one’s dreary pulse. Yes, this is a
prayer open to bargaining. Let it be
answered no later than just around the next darkened bend and certain
weaknesses of the flesh will be forsworn for a reasonable period of time. What weaknesses? – you may ask. Now would be a good time to list and savor
each temptation in explicit detail as there is no salvation waiting the truck now
rounding the road’s gloomy turn.

Memory is induced and imagination brings to life pleasurable
visions, intimate scent, soft-spoken words and exploring touch. An enveloping shroud hides all that is beyond
the reach of one’s headlamps but now the miles peel off with no apparent
concern. There is theatre of reignited
joys being played out behind the driver’s steady gaze. At some point the mind wanders into the lives
of various people the driver has known. What
ever happened to the woman whose passenger door fell off its hinges at the
drive-in theater? She warned you not to
open the door but it didn’t make much impression until you actually grabbed the
handle and the whole door crashed to the ground. Then there was the woman who could only talk
to you through a hand-puppet. She wore
the puppet everywhere. Her garden had
clay masks carefully arranged in the soil and they appeared to break the earth
so that they would always be looking up into the sky. How do you live among such fragile people
while harboring any sense of selfishness?

One’s thoughts and moods flow. Time and miles become one and the same. The snow no longer falls. The bend just now turned becomes a long stretch
of straightaway. At its far-off end appears
a pearl of light that, in time, becomes a tall sign and then a space flooded by
overhead lamps and neatly aligned pumps for diesel. There is a sharp gasp from the old truck’s
air brakes and then it makes a wide turn to pull up into the fueling
station. Opening the cab door you are
met with the bone-chilling bluster of a stiff wind. Long johns would have been much appreciated
right now. Time to push through that
glass door and warm up inside. Time to refill
your thermos with the strongest coffee they have. Time to touch base with whatever human being
is manning the counter. God knows how
long they’ve been without a friendly word.

Daylight will soon be here.
The truck fueled, it’s time to throttle up. The cab gives a jerk and the truck slowly rumbles
its way through several gears before settling on a decent cruising speed. There are many miles to go and the need for
sleep will return but, for now, all is good – hot coffee in hand and a thin red
line appearing on the horizon where the sun will soon emerge.